It is known for organizations to use service-oriented architecture (SOA) methods, systems and governance models to develop and deploy shareable and reusable services which need to evolve over time. However, problems arise from provider-driven SOA models. Vendors may release and implement product or application updates without request by an organization, for example when new product versions are released or maintenance support is dropped for older versions. An organization may be forced to deploy new product releases or revisions independent of need, even if new product capabilities are not useful or required.
Often a product vendor or service provider cannot practically identify all the interdependencies associated with a product revision in order to accurately anticipate problems that may be caused by a revision or update roll-out. A vendor may not be able to perform adequate integration testing without accurately duplicating a client organization infrastructure environment, and such accurate duplication may be impossible or impractical. Consequently, routine testing of product version updates may be deficient in detecting and identifying functional breakage within an organizational information technology (IT) environment-caused by the introduction of the update.